OSfOM

This IPX came to me via classified ads. With 2 SBus cards in it, an ISDN card and, as a special feature, the Sun Coprocessor DX2 card, which is used by the SUNpc software.

• As was to be expected, the power supply unit was broken - fortunately a recapping was sufficient.
• Unfortunately, one of the 4 16MB modules was also defective, so the IPX has “only” 48MB RAM for the time being - hopefully a replacement will be found.

The SPARCstation IPX: The Faster Lunchbox 

Sun Microsystems released the SPARCstation IPX in July 1991 as the successor to the SPARCstation IPC. It retained the earlier machine's "lunchbox" chassis, which took up less desk space than Sun's "pizza box" systems.

The IPX upgraded the IPC's 25 MHz processor to a 40 MHz chip and included architectural adjustments that increased performance. It also added onboard color graphics, replacing the monochrome-only video on the IPC motherboard. Like its predecessor, the IPX included SBus expansion slots.

The system was used in technical, scientific, and software development settings where desktop space was limited. Like other hardware from that period, it relied on an NVRAM chip with a built-in battery to store configuration settings. Because these batteries eventually die, keeping an IPX running today requires replacing or modifying the chip. The model was released before Sun moved the SPARCstation line to microSPARC and SuperSPARC architectures.